Chapter 216
He tightened his thighs around the saddle, trying to stay upright through sheer force of will, but his body had already reached its limit.
In the end, he collapsed onto the frozen snow.
“Your Grace!”
Someone barely managed to catch him as he slipped from his horse.
Kneeling on the ground while struggling to steady his breathing, Varkas brushed aside the hands trying to support him and used the shaft of his halberd as a crutch to force himself back upright.
But his vision twisted once more.
Resting his forehead against the halberd, he waited for the dizziness to subside before glancing down at his abdomen.
It seemed his reckless movements had torn the wound open.
Blood continued pouring from the gap in his slashed armor.
One of the mounted warriors ripped apart Varkas's surcoat and hastily pressed it against the wound before shouting,
“Bring a healer! Now!”
Realizing he could no longer remain standing, Varkas slowly lay back on the snow.
He felt no pain.
But the cold spreading through his body and the overwhelming exhaustion were unmistakably real.
Perhaps this is the last thing I'll ever see.
With that thought, he looked up at the sky.
The beautiful cobalt blue of the late afternoon poured into his fading vision.
At that moment, a dull ache spread through his chest.
Strange.
The sword had pierced his side.
So why did it feel as though there were a hole in his heart?
After blinking his blurred eyes several times, Varkas finally closed them in exhaustion.
* * *
A gentle breeze rich with the scent of grass softly brushed across his face.
Mixed within it was the sweet fragrance of ripe fruit.
Sensing it, Varkas immediately changed direction.
Not long afterward, he finally found the girl he had spent hours searching for beside a pond glowing crimson beneath the setting sun.
She was sitting on a thick tree branch roughly level with his shoulders, swinging her bare feet.
Looking up at her with obvious disapproval, Varkas spoke.
“Aren't you a little too old to be climbing trees?”
The blue eyes that had been quietly watching the violet lake shifted toward him.
“Not yet. Until I'm fifteen, I can do whatever I want.”
Varkas raised one eyebrow in disbelief.
Young ladies of noble birth usually began learning proper etiquette as early as eight or nine.
He was about to point that out.
Instead, he sighed and held out one hand.
“It's getting late. Please come down now.”
The girl stared down at him with an unreadable expression before abruptly turning her head away.
“I can't.”
He narrowed his eyes.
Under his silent stare, she casually swung one pale foot beneath the skirt she had rolled up to her calves.
“See this? I'm barefoot. I can't go anywhere.”
“...What happened to your shoes?”
“I don't know. They rolled away somewhere over there.”
She pointed toward the thick brush growing down the gentle slope leading to the lakeshore.
Suppressing another sigh, Varkas climbed down and searched through the bushes.
Eventually he found a tiny pair of velvet shoes scarcely larger than his own palm.
After brushing away the dirt, he returned beneath the tree.
The girl immediately stretched one foot toward him.
“Here.”
For a brief moment Varkas frowned at the way she treated him—a knight and the heir to the Grand Duchy—as though he were nothing more than an insignificant servant.
Nevertheless, he gently took one of her feet into his hands and carefully slipped the shoe onto it.
The little toes wriggled continuously, apparently ticklish.
She then offered him the other foot.
Without a single complaint, Varkas put on the second shoe as well.
Straightening up afterward, he tilted his head slightly.
“Is that satisfactory now?”
“What do you mean, satisfactory? Now you have to help me down.”
She stretched both arms toward him with a perfectly matter-of-fact expression.
Varkas stood there watching her for a moment.
Finally, he let out a resigned sigh before lifting her effortlessly from the branch.
He was just about to set her on the ground when two soft white arms wrapped themselves around his neck.
Caught completely off guard, he froze.
The next moment, however, he caught the unmistakable scent of strong wine and frowned.
So that explained why she ✧ NоvеIight ✧ (Original source) had been unusually clingy.
She must have secretly stolen some alcohol from somewhere.
Pulling the girl away from his chest, he questioned her sternly.
“Where did you get the wine?”
“It's a secret.”
She giggled softly.
The clear laughter, as light as the spring breeze itself, instantly swept away every sharp reprimand lingering on the tip of his tongue.
He stared at the little face, flushed a delicate shade of pink, with unfamiliar eyes.
He simply could not look away.
The girl who always wore an expression as though she wished she were dead was smiling now—brightly, without a trace of sorrow.
“Look, Varkas. The moon's out.”
She suddenly pointed toward the sky, now deepening into indigo.
Following her fingertip, he saw a crescent moon hanging along the boundary between crimson and blue.
She gazed at it for a long time, as though she had discovered a priceless treasure.
Then she murmured dreamily,
“One year from now... I'll be sixteen.”
Those blue eyes, glistening as though filled with water, slowly lowered until they met his.
“You know... when that day comes...”
Her slow, gentle voice suddenly broke off.
Varkas blankly watched as her figure dissolved like a mirage.
A fierce wind swept in from somewhere, engulfing him.
The next instant, he was standing in the courtyard of Laedgo Castle.
Beyond a garden overflowing with blooming flowers, he saw her.
Bathed in brilliant sunlight, she smiled with unmistakable happiness.
In her arms rested a small boy.
She gazed down at the child's face with the very same eyes she had once turned toward the moon.
Then she lifted her head and looked at him.
Varkas.
He slowly approached the woman calling his name.
As though granting him a rare blessing, she turned the child toward him.
"Look. Isn't he beautiful?"
Her voice brimmed with pride, as though she were showing him the world's greatest treasure.
She pressed her rose-colored lips against the child's smooth cheek.
Without blinking, Varkas watched the scene.
Then his gaze slowly fell upon the child in her arms.
A tiny face that seemed to combine both of their features.
Brilliant sapphire-blue eyes sparkled beneath delicate lashes.
And over that face flashed another.
A cold gray face lying motionless within a swaddling cloth.
Were eyes just as blue hidden forever behind those eyelids that would never open again?
Lost in that thought, Varkas slowly reached out and touched the child's cheek.
The moment he did, the fragile illusion crumbled like a mirage.
The woman smiling so radiantly scattered into ashes as well.
Watching everything that had sparkled silently melt away into the wind, Varkas slowly closed his empty hand.
Then everything around him shattered.
The wind swept away even the last fragments of the illusion.
Nothing remained.
Only a body slowly decaying...
...and endless emptiness.
His knees gave way beneath him.
Collapsing onto the ground, Varkas simply stared into that infinite wasteland.
* * *
“Are you finally awake?”
The first thing Varkas saw after opening his eyes with a faint groan was Daren's gaunt face.
Why is the man who should be defending Tarlin here?
Frowning, he then realized he was not inside a military tent but in a lavishly furnished bedroom.
He immediately pushed himself upright.
Seeing that, Daren paled and hurriedly forced him back down by the shoulders.
“Your wound hasn't fully healed yet. You mustn't move.”
Varkas lowered his gaze toward his body.
Pure white bandages were tightly wrapped around his bare abdomen.
When he lightly pressed against them, a sharp pulling pain immediately shot through the wound.
Looking back at Daren in confusion, he asked,
“Why wasn't healing magic used?”
“Why wouldn't it have been?”
Dropping heavily into a chair, Daren let out an exhausted sigh.
“Four high-ranking priests worked on you continuously, pouring divine power into your body.”
He rubbed his tired face before continuing.
“It seems the sword had been coated with monster venom. Healing magic barely worked, so the priests had to devote themselves to treating you for a full fifteen days.”
One of Varkas's eyebrows rose.
“Exactly how long was I unconscious?”
“For exactly two weeks and five days.”